Pakistan-American issues; AQ on the run
What happened about 2 weeks ago in the remote border mountain regions of western Pakistan may well be a watershed moment for South Asia. What the media (outside of FoxNews) isn't telling anyone is that the American covert hellfire missile strike on a village in that remote region of Pakistan is that it targeted- and killed- top level Al Qaeda members (http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=1517986). We definitely got the head bomb-maker for AQ, Abu Khabab al-Masri (aka Midhat Mursi) and many of Zawahiri's (the #2 guy in AQ) top aides as well.
Of course, the media's playing up how Pakistan is all pissed off that the US killed "civilians" in their country, and how they were just "villagers". Bullshit. The Pakistanis have admitted that there were at the minimum 5 to 6 AQ members at the village. And on top of that, the early rumors were that the US did in fact kill Zawahiri, and then the Pakistanis backed off that claim, to revert to their "civilians" claim, and then switched that to what we're hearing now, about the mid-range AQ members being killed. Again, I smell a great deal of bullshit.
We know that the villagers pulled bodies out of the wreckage of the missile attack, and buried them elsewhere. That strongly smacks of them trying to hide something. And it also says that these "villagers" aren't really villagers, but rather, direct supporters of AQ. And their deaths mean nothing to anyone, since they were knowingly aiding AQ terrorists who would bring the wrath of the US military down on them if they were found out. And they were. And the Geneva Convention doesn't put the onus on us to protect these "civilians" but rather, for the terrorists and/or enemy combatants to take it upon themselves to protect them.
And on top of all this, we get two more things happening. The first is that Bin Laden himself issued a tape. In that taped speech, either OBL or someone pretending to be OBL (rumors about his death, which are very credible, have not been silenced with the tape), wanted a "long term peace" with the United States if we were to leave Afghanistan and Iraq. That says that he's realizing how badly he's gotten his ass kicked since 2001, and how badly Iraq has gone for him. To be honest, he may actually really be sincere about leaving Iraq, since he's lost ANY chance of getting that country back, even with us leaving. And he doesn't quite trust Zarqawi anymore, either. The other thing is, is that the tape comes on the heels of the Pakistani attack- and it may well be an indication of how badly AQ was hit there. It very well could be a PR offensive- make everyone think things are ok, swell, great, blah blah blah. He sees how the Dems are playing in Congress, and is hoping they'll force some sort of negotiations on Bush- but he misses that the President's now a lame duck and can care less about Congress, and that the American public is increasingly hostile to the Democrat's anti-foriegn policy.
The second thing is that Zawahiri made a taped speech, too (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060121/ap_on_re_mi_ea/al_qaida_zawahri). It could well be just an old tape someone put up online just to have it there, but it could well be AQ trying to say "hi, Zawahiri's sitll around, and we're all one big happy family". Why would they do that, especially after the Pakistani bombings? And why not before?
Zawahiri is probably dead, or at least his security has been compromised. We've just rendered him either useless as an AQ operative from a security standpoint, or we've turned him into goo. And AQ's basically sending signals with both OBL and Zawahiri's tape that we did just that. This hurts them badly, from a PR and manpower standpoint, since the people who are replacing them in Iraq and Afghanistan aren't exactly what AQ had before. If they lose their heads, they'll probably splinter into different regional factions, all with their own funding and resource polls independent from one another. In fact, that's pretty much what happened in Iraq with Zarqawi.
And that brings it full circle back to Pakistan. I can understand why their gov't would be upset- especially if the US miiltary pulled the missile attack operation off without telling the Pakistanis. But odds are, the Pakistanis were in the know from the get go, and what they're doing is just trying to distance themselves from whatever fallout there is from the bombing. They get to have their cake and eat it, too. I really don't have a problem with that, since they ARE a soverign nation, and should by all rights bitch about whatever they want to. Musharraf has to walk a fine line in dealing with the moderate and radical segments of Pakistan in issues like these. As long as he doesn't go out of his way to really piss off the US, I don't have a problem with him eating his cake.
Of course, the media in general is trying to pretend that the US didn't kill any AQ terrorists there, and that they were only civilians. Oh, and they're playing up that the Pakistanis are rioting over it. Typical leftist-agenda-as-journalism reporting, with America as the big bad imperialistic bully who doesn't care about the little guy. Oh, and those lovely photos you're seeing from Pakistan, of the protesters? They claim it's in the thousands, but I saw a photo, if you look really closely (I'll try to track it down, it'll be hard) you see that the crowd ends down the street. Which means that most likely, the crowd numbered between 500-1000 people. Not "in the thousands". And since that photo, I've seen more and more photos go for the "close up in with the crowd, make it look like there's more than there really are" schtick.
No wonder the media's falling apart around us- they're too busy saying "gotcha! gotcha, you motherfuckers!" while everyone else is busy trying to fight- and win- a war. They're missing that there IS a war going on, and that instead, are pretending that everything the US military does is somehow wrong, without telling us why, or how to fix it.
Go fix yourselves media. Maybe you should start singing the "Battle Cry of Freedom" while we pound more terrorists into sand.
Of course, the media's playing up how Pakistan is all pissed off that the US killed "civilians" in their country, and how they were just "villagers". Bullshit. The Pakistanis have admitted that there were at the minimum 5 to 6 AQ members at the village. And on top of that, the early rumors were that the US did in fact kill Zawahiri, and then the Pakistanis backed off that claim, to revert to their "civilians" claim, and then switched that to what we're hearing now, about the mid-range AQ members being killed. Again, I smell a great deal of bullshit.
We know that the villagers pulled bodies out of the wreckage of the missile attack, and buried them elsewhere. That strongly smacks of them trying to hide something. And it also says that these "villagers" aren't really villagers, but rather, direct supporters of AQ. And their deaths mean nothing to anyone, since they were knowingly aiding AQ terrorists who would bring the wrath of the US military down on them if they were found out. And they were. And the Geneva Convention doesn't put the onus on us to protect these "civilians" but rather, for the terrorists and/or enemy combatants to take it upon themselves to protect them.
And on top of all this, we get two more things happening. The first is that Bin Laden himself issued a tape. In that taped speech, either OBL or someone pretending to be OBL (rumors about his death, which are very credible, have not been silenced with the tape), wanted a "long term peace" with the United States if we were to leave Afghanistan and Iraq. That says that he's realizing how badly he's gotten his ass kicked since 2001, and how badly Iraq has gone for him. To be honest, he may actually really be sincere about leaving Iraq, since he's lost ANY chance of getting that country back, even with us leaving. And he doesn't quite trust Zarqawi anymore, either. The other thing is, is that the tape comes on the heels of the Pakistani attack- and it may well be an indication of how badly AQ was hit there. It very well could be a PR offensive- make everyone think things are ok, swell, great, blah blah blah. He sees how the Dems are playing in Congress, and is hoping they'll force some sort of negotiations on Bush- but he misses that the President's now a lame duck and can care less about Congress, and that the American public is increasingly hostile to the Democrat's anti-foriegn policy.
The second thing is that Zawahiri made a taped speech, too (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060121/ap_on_re_mi_ea/al_qaida_zawahri). It could well be just an old tape someone put up online just to have it there, but it could well be AQ trying to say "hi, Zawahiri's sitll around, and we're all one big happy family". Why would they do that, especially after the Pakistani bombings? And why not before?
Zawahiri is probably dead, or at least his security has been compromised. We've just rendered him either useless as an AQ operative from a security standpoint, or we've turned him into goo. And AQ's basically sending signals with both OBL and Zawahiri's tape that we did just that. This hurts them badly, from a PR and manpower standpoint, since the people who are replacing them in Iraq and Afghanistan aren't exactly what AQ had before. If they lose their heads, they'll probably splinter into different regional factions, all with their own funding and resource polls independent from one another. In fact, that's pretty much what happened in Iraq with Zarqawi.
And that brings it full circle back to Pakistan. I can understand why their gov't would be upset- especially if the US miiltary pulled the missile attack operation off without telling the Pakistanis. But odds are, the Pakistanis were in the know from the get go, and what they're doing is just trying to distance themselves from whatever fallout there is from the bombing. They get to have their cake and eat it, too. I really don't have a problem with that, since they ARE a soverign nation, and should by all rights bitch about whatever they want to. Musharraf has to walk a fine line in dealing with the moderate and radical segments of Pakistan in issues like these. As long as he doesn't go out of his way to really piss off the US, I don't have a problem with him eating his cake.
Of course, the media in general is trying to pretend that the US didn't kill any AQ terrorists there, and that they were only civilians. Oh, and they're playing up that the Pakistanis are rioting over it. Typical leftist-agenda-as-journalism reporting, with America as the big bad imperialistic bully who doesn't care about the little guy. Oh, and those lovely photos you're seeing from Pakistan, of the protesters? They claim it's in the thousands, but I saw a photo, if you look really closely (I'll try to track it down, it'll be hard) you see that the crowd ends down the street. Which means that most likely, the crowd numbered between 500-1000 people. Not "in the thousands". And since that photo, I've seen more and more photos go for the "close up in with the crowd, make it look like there's more than there really are" schtick.
No wonder the media's falling apart around us- they're too busy saying "gotcha! gotcha, you motherfuckers!" while everyone else is busy trying to fight- and win- a war. They're missing that there IS a war going on, and that instead, are pretending that everything the US military does is somehow wrong, without telling us why, or how to fix it.
Go fix yourselves media. Maybe you should start singing the "Battle Cry of Freedom" while we pound more terrorists into sand.
posted by Fafhrd1 | 11:51 AM
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